Staring death in the face: Karamoja on brink of starvation
Sep 07, 2008
THE failure of two successive rainy seasons and the resultant food shortfall, coupled with last year’s floods which destroyed crops means that three quarters of the one million people living in Karamoja will be at risk of starvation in the coming months,†Rose Enyoru, the World Food Programme he
More than 350,000 people living in Karamoja, a region in north-eastern Uganda, are starving to death as a result of drought. Frederick Womakuyu visited Karamoja recently and reports
THE failure of two successive rainy seasons and the resultant food shortfall, coupled with last year’s floods which destroyed crops means that three quarters of the one million people living in Karamoja will be at risk of starvation in the coming months,†Rose Enyoru, the World Food Programme head of sub-office said. “These people are in dire need of food aid,†Enyoru said.
Paul Lomanio, the LC5 chairman Kotido said many families have been surviving on wild fruits and rats which are also hard to find.
“Children, the elderly people and women are the most affected,†he said.
There have been warnings of drought and impeding famine for several months, but now the situation is reaching a crisis level. Lomanio added that the condition is so pathetic with several causalties and massive migrations.
Only last week, three people out of the seven admitted at Kotido Town Council Health Centre succumbed to hunger, Joshua Kodet, a clinical officer at the centre, said.
“At first, we thought it was disease but when we confirmed it was starvation, we gave food to the four surviving ones and their condition is improving,†Kodet said.
Peterken Lochap, the LC5 chairman of Moroto district, said in August, 18 people died in Ngolereit Parish. Lomanio confirms that in May, 37 people died due to starvation at Panyangara sub-county in Lomokori kraal in Kotido.
“The animals died due to drought and because the people had nothing to eat, they also died. The UPDF has stopped people from moving to graze in other districts outside Karamoja, therefore they can’t access water and pasture for their animals,†Lomanio added.
Karimojong cause insecurity in other areas when they go to graze so preventing them from accessing other areas was the only option.
Aston Kajara, the minister of state for Karamoja said: “Disarmament and keeping them away from other districts surrounding Karamoja has led to a reduction in armed violence and cattle rustling.â€
In a related incident, about 30% of the population in Kotido has migrated to other districts and even Kenya, Lomanio explained.
“People have gone to Abim, Kitgum, Soroti and Kampala to look for what to eat. We fear that when the situation worsens, the whole population will migrate and also bring problems to their host areas,†he said.
Fears persist that many parts of Karamoja will soon follow suite, though the ministry of Karamoja affairs say it is securing sh6b as emergency funds to salvage the situation.
“This money will help to address the situation. But we are working out long-term measures that will see the region produce its own food,†Kajara added.
He said the Government is sensitising the people to address agricultural production and a sh445b project — the Karamoja Integrated Disarmament and Development Programme (KIDDP) was launched earlier this year to revamp agriculture and encourage people to grow crops and be self-reliant.
For the time being, Enyoru said WFP need about 4,000 metric tonnes of food per month to meet the current demand, but this may double by the end of the year.
“The drought is so severe that no rain fell at the right time and when it did, it rained in the wrong planting season and the few who had planted lost all their crops,†he added. Even sorghum, the staple food in the region has been affected.
“Some regions of Karamoja, especially the traditional sorghum-growing areas, have experienced total crop failure. The formerly food basket areas are no more,†she said.
Areas like Iriir, Kalapata, Matanyi, Panyangara, Karenga, Lopado and Lopei experienced total crop failure due to the unpredictability of the weather.
In some places insecurity has largely contributed to thefamine, said Lomanio.
“In some places, cattle raids had forced sorghum farmers out of their farms. They fled abandoning their sorghum in the fields, which was eventually harvested by thugs,†he adds.
Still healing from the aftermath of raids, residents of the agriculturally rich Lorelia and Iriiri had high expectations from this year’s budget, which was read in Parliament by the finance minister, Dr. Ezra Suruma.
They needed the funds to promote agriculture in the region by constructing boreholes and water dams that can be used for irrigating the lands, said John Ogwel, the LC3 chairman, Iriiri.
Iriiri, Loreria and Karenga are the bread basket of Karamoja, but there is hardly enough grain to aid the famine-stricken residents.
Even worse, the floods in the region last year led to more families going hungry because all their crops were destroyed and nothing was left for this season.
In Matanyi, the floods destroyed all the plantations rendering the economic life virtually dysfunctional.
About 600,000 and 400,000 people were expecting some relief food from WFP and the Office of the Prime Minister promised to them by President Yoweri Museveni last year when he visited the region, but the promise is yet to be fulfilled.
“Little has come and it has reached only town areas. The prime minister’s office delivered only 200 bags of maize and 60 bags of bean – that cannot even feed a third of what the President told them to cover,†said Lomanio.
WFP has done something but there is a dire need for more food. A recent survey conducted by Lomanio and his team revealed a grave situation, one of human beings competing for wild fruits with domestic animals, especially goats and cows.
At a village called Lwelotei in Karenga in July, school children had to abandon school to accompany their parents to bushes to look for wild fruits.
“This fruit is pounded before being boiled in three different stages to remove the bitter taste and to make it soft. The boiling takes at least 24 hours if the fruits were still fresh, but sometimes it takes two days when they are dry,†Lomanio said.
According to the locals, food, especially the common sorghum that is a favourite meal in almost all homes, is now increasingly becoming rare as some residents said they last tasted the precious meal about six months ago.
They have only been surviving on wild fruits.
Anna Aleper, 75, said her husband succumbed to hunger three weeks ago after going without food for more than two weeks. His fresh grave stands in the middle of her compound.
The widow, a mother of eight, said her chances of survival were slim because she could not climb up the trees to harvest the wild fruit due to her age coupled with a broken arm.
Emaciated children emerging from the huts, staring starvation in the face is evidence of the grave suffering of the people in this part of the country.
Wilson Lowal, the speaker of Iriiri sub-county in Moroto district, says the problem is getting worse day by day and several people have died in Nabwal and Tepeth Parish. “Right now, seven people are on the verge of death in the bush where their relatives abandoned them because they were too weak to walk on as their families scampered for wild fruits,†he said.
The speaker said attempts to get assistance in the form of relief food from the Government have been fruitless as they only give empty promises. He says that the Government has neglected them and wondered who to turn to next.
In Iriiri trading centre, essential commodities are very expensive as unscrupulous traders take advantage of the worsening situation. Two kilogrammes of sorghum flour goes for sh1,700. This is too expensive for most families.
Many families have fled their homes and settled in Abim, the only green zone in Karamoja. We were tired of trekking long distances looking for water,†said Peter Longolesia.
“We came to live in Abim because we use a lot of water in cooking wild fruits. We used to walk for more than 20 kilometres to fetch water.†Lomanio said it has been difficult for the villagers as the livestock they depended were raided by rustlers from as far as Turkana in the neighbouring Kenya.
He appeals to the international community to send food aid immediately to save lives.
THE failure of two successive rainy seasons and the resultant food shortfall, coupled with last year’s floods which destroyed crops means that three quarters of the one million people living in Karamoja will be at risk of starvation in the coming months,†Rose Enyoru, the World Food Programme head of sub-office said. “These people are in dire need of food aid,†Enyoru said.
Paul Lomanio, the LC5 chairman Kotido said many families have been surviving on wild fruits and rats which are also hard to find.
“Children, the elderly people and women are the most affected,†he said.
There have been warnings of drought and impeding famine for several months, but now the situation is reaching a crisis level. Lomanio added that the condition is so pathetic with several causalties and massive migrations.
Only last week, three people out of the seven admitted at Kotido Town Council Health Centre succumbed to hunger, Joshua Kodet, a clinical officer at the centre, said.
“At first, we thought it was disease but when we confirmed it was starvation, we gave food to the four surviving ones and their condition is improving,†Kodet said.
Peterken Lochap, the LC5 chairman of Moroto district, said in August, 18 people died in Ngolereit Parish. Lomanio confirms that in May, 37 people died due to starvation at Panyangara sub-county in Lomokori kraal in Kotido.
“The animals died due to drought and because the people had nothing to eat, they also died. The UPDF has stopped people from moving to graze in other districts outside Karamoja, therefore they can’t access water and pasture for their animals,†Lomanio added.
Karimojong cause insecurity in other areas when they go to graze so preventing them from accessing other areas was the only option.
Aston Kajara, the minister of state for Karamoja said: “Disarmament and keeping them away from other districts surrounding Karamoja has led to a reduction in armed violence and cattle rustling.â€
In a related incident, about 30% of the population in Kotido has migrated to other districts and even Kenya, Lomanio explained.
“People have gone to Abim, Kitgum, Soroti and Kampala to look for what to eat. We fear that when the situation worsens, the whole population will migrate and also bring problems to their host areas,†he said.
Fears persist that many parts of Karamoja will soon follow suite, though the ministry of Karamoja affairs say it is securing sh6b as emergency funds to salvage the situation.
“This money will help to address the situation. But we are working out long-term measures that will see the region produce its own food,†Kajara added.
He said the Government is sensitising the people to address agricultural production and a sh445b project — the Karamoja Integrated Disarmament and Development Programme (KIDDP) was launched earlier this year to revamp agriculture and encourage people to grow crops and be self-reliant.
For the time being, Enyoru said WFP need about 4,000 metric tonnes of food per month to meet the current demand, but this may double by the end of the year.
“The drought is so severe that no rain fell at the right time and when it did, it rained in the wrong planting season and the few who had planted lost all their crops,†he added. Even sorghum, the staple food in the region has been affected.
“Some regions of Karamoja, especially the traditional sorghum-growing areas, have experienced total crop failure. The formerly food basket areas are no more,†she said.
Areas like Iriir, Kalapata, Matanyi, Panyangara, Karenga, Lopado and Lopei experienced total crop failure due to the unpredictability of the weather.
In some places insecurity has largely contributed to thefamine, said Lomanio.
“In some places, cattle raids had forced sorghum farmers out of their farms. They fled abandoning their sorghum in the fields, which was eventually harvested by thugs,†he adds.
Still healing from the aftermath of raids, residents of the agriculturally rich Lorelia and Iriiri had high expectations from this year’s budget, which was read in Parliament by the finance minister, Dr. Ezra Suruma.
They needed the funds to promote agriculture in the region by constructing boreholes and water dams that can be used for irrigating the lands, said John Ogwel, the LC3 chairman, Iriiri.
Iriiri, Loreria and Karenga are the bread basket of Karamoja, but there is hardly enough grain to aid the famine-stricken residents.
Even worse, the floods in the region last year led to more families going hungry because all their crops were destroyed and nothing was left for this season.
In Matanyi, the floods destroyed all the plantations rendering the economic life virtually dysfunctional.
About 600,000 and 400,000 people were expecting some relief food from WFP and the Office of the Prime Minister promised to them by President Yoweri Museveni last year when he visited the region, but the promise is yet to be fulfilled.
“Little has come and it has reached only town areas. The prime minister’s office delivered only 200 bags of maize and 60 bags of bean – that cannot even feed a third of what the President told them to cover,†said Lomanio.
WFP has done something but there is a dire need for more food. A recent survey conducted by Lomanio and his team revealed a grave situation, one of human beings competing for wild fruits with domestic animals, especially goats and cows.
At a village called Lwelotei in Karenga in July, school children had to abandon school to accompany their parents to bushes to look for wild fruits.
“This fruit is pounded before being boiled in three different stages to remove the bitter taste and to make it soft. The boiling takes at least 24 hours if the fruits were still fresh, but sometimes it takes two days when they are dry,†Lomanio said.
According to the locals, food, especially the common sorghum that is a favourite meal in almost all homes, is now increasingly becoming rare as some residents said they last tasted the precious meal about six months ago.
They have only been surviving on wild fruits.
Anna Aleper, 75, said her husband succumbed to hunger three weeks ago after going without food for more than two weeks. His fresh grave stands in the middle of her compound.
The widow, a mother of eight, said her chances of survival were slim because she could not climb up the trees to harvest the wild fruit due to her age coupled with a broken arm.
Emaciated children emerging from the huts, staring starvation in the face is evidence of the grave suffering of the people in this part of the country.
Wilson Lowal, the speaker of Iriiri sub-county in Moroto district, says the problem is getting worse day by day and several people have died in Nabwal and Tepeth Parish. “Right now, seven people are on the verge of death in the bush where their relatives abandoned them because they were too weak to walk on as their families scampered for wild fruits,†he said.
The speaker said attempts to get assistance in the form of relief food from the Government have been fruitless as they only give empty promises. He says that the Government has neglected them and wondered who to turn to next.
In Iriiri trading centre, essential commodities are very expensive as unscrupulous traders take advantage of the worsening situation. Two kilogrammes of sorghum flour goes for sh1,700. This is too expensive for most families.
Many families have fled their homes and settled in Abim, the only green zone in Karamoja. We were tired of trekking long distances looking for water,†said Peter Longolesia.
“We came to live in Abim because we use a lot of water in cooking wild fruits. We used to walk for more than 20 kilometres to fetch water.†Lomanio said it has been difficult for the villagers as the livestock they depended were raided by rustlers from as far as Turkana in the neighbouring Kenya.
He appeals to the international community to send food aid immediately to save lives.